Phoenix Wright Movie Coming to US and Beyond

With the 84th annual Academy Awards creeping ever closer, now is a great time to look back on all the movies 2011 had to offer. There were some decent films, but even a cursory glance at the past year's cinematic offerings shows a woeful lack of action movies starring big-haired, tenacious lawyers with an inexplicable interest in yelling "Objection!" at every possible circumstance in which the phrase is even somewhat appropriate. It may be too late to correct this major Hollywood oversight now, but at least our 2012 won't be suffering a similar affliction. According to famed Japanese horror director Takashi Miike, his latest film, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, will see release in America and Europe later this year. Take that, 2011!

While there's not yet been a specific date set for the film's worldwide release, the movie will storm Japanese theaters on February 11th. Miike has already premiered the film at this year's IFFR (that's the International Film Festival Rotterdam in case you were wondering) to mixed reviews from critics and strong reviews by the common folk. That should come as a surprise to no one, considering it's a movie shot by an indie horror director based on a Nintendo DS game that features an anime lawyer in the future solving a murder with the help of a ghost.

When and how the film will travel to US shores is still a mystery as large as the Turnabout Samurai, but what we do know is that the release will include a variety of region-specific localized subtitled and dubbed versions. This is helpful, if not completely necessary, considering the wide variety of character names and locations depending on where you are in the world. Even if this comes as a straight-to-video release, I don't think anyone will object to having an official version of this available outside of Asia in whatever form it takes.